Cory Doctorow

Cory Doctorow

EFF Special Advisor

Cory Doctorow is a science fiction author, activist, journalist and blogger -- the co-editor of Boing Boing and the author of young adult novels like HOMELAND, PIRATE CINEMA and LITTLE BROTHER and novels for adults like RAPTURE OF THE NERDS and MAKERS. He is the former European director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation and co-founded the UK Open Rights Group. Born in Toronto, Canada, he now lives in London.

Deeplinks Posts by Cory

Kids are often the involuntary early adopters of controlling, abusive technology, whether that's spying school laptops, location tracking phones apps, or teenager-repelling buzzers that emit tones that adult ears can't hear. If you want to see your future, look at what we're doing to the kids.

Kids are often the involuntary early adopters of controlling, abusive technology, whether that's spying school laptops, location tracking phones apps, or teenager-repelling buzzers that emit tones that adult ears can't hear. If you want to see your future, look at what we're doing to the kids around you.

As we move from having computers in our pockets to computers on our skin to computers inside our body, whether we use computers becomes less voluntary, and who gets to control those computers gets more critical.

EFF supporter Benjamin McLean was kind enough to send along his "Mashup Maker" as a new entry to our Catalog of Missing Devices, a tour through some of the legitimate, useful and missing gadgets, tools and services that don't exist but should. They're technologies whose chance to exist was...

In today's world, your ability to choose something as everyday as a typeface depends on the permission of the company that made your device and the software that runs on it. Choosing your typeface may seem like a novelty, but type design can have far-ranging implications for accessibility (some fonts...

The Catalog of Missing Devices is a tour through some of the legitimate, useful and missing gadgets, tools and services that don't exist but should. They're technologies whose chance to exist was snuffed out by Section 1201 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998, which makes tampering with...

In 2009, Amazon introduced, then rescinded a feature that allowed Kindle owners to have their Kindles read any text aloud. This was a godsend for people with print disabilities and anyone who wanted to have text converted to speech. But even though people had bought devices...

Update: due to popular demand, we've moved to a bigger space! We'll be at UCLA Moore Hall, Room 3340 (Reading Room), 457 Portola Plaza, Los Angeles, CA 90095. There's 20 new spaces open: RSVP today! A law intended to stop people from making off-brand DVD players now means that...

Since the invention of the remote control, rightsholders and audience have fought a war over ads. The market for tools to skip, mask or mute ads holds publishers and marketers to account: they know that if their ads get too obnoxious, their audiences will be motivated to make them disappear...

The Supreme Court says that copyright requires "escape valves" like fair use to comply with the First Amendment, which guarantees freedom of expression. Fair use -- and its non-US cousin, Fair Dealing -- allows people to make new works from copyrighted materials without permission, especially when it comes to political...